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2006 Australian Superbike Championship (YMF Loan) - Round Seven - Eastern Creek, NSW - November 17/18/19 |
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2006 Australian Superbike Championship (YMF Loan) - Round Seven - Eastern Creek, NSW - November 17/18/19 |
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Day 2 Report
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| The scene is set for the
final round of the YMF Loan Australian Superbike
Championship at Eastern Creek, with title favourite Jamie
Stauffer maintaining his unblemished qualifying record,
adding another pole position to his extensive list of 2006
achievements today. With just minutes remaining in the final session, Stauffer emerged from the pits and shattered his previous best effort, laying down a 1.30.321 - the fastest ever recorded lap of Eastern Creek by a motorcycle rider. The time shaved a narrow margin off the benchmark of Grand Prix rider, Spaniard Alex Criville set on a 500cc GP machine some years ago. Stauffer will now have started from the number 1 position on the grid at every Superbike race in 2006, and is just two races away from claiming the first ever number 1 plate for Yamaha. “This is fantastic news, when I did the lap I wasn’t actually aware I’d gone that fast, I had to wait until I’d ridden back into the pits for the guys to tell me,” said Stauffer. “The bike felt great out there today, things looked a bit grim after the first session where we finished third, but with a little more heat in the track and a different Dunlop tyre we were really able to work at that time.” “7 poles from 7 rounds in the season is really pleasing also, I wasn’t actually focusing on breaking any kind of record this weekend and it really is a testament to the bike and the team that I’m able to go out there and lap this quickly.” “Tomorrow should be a great day for racing, I really hope we can wrap up Yamaha’s first ever Superbike title and finish the season off with a few more wins.” Early pacesetter Shannon Johnson appeared to have extracted every last thousandth from his Kawasaki early in the piece, and was powerless to stop Stauffer as he disposed of the time by mid-session. Suzuki’s Shawn Giles laid down a late challenge, and slipped by Johnson to eclipse the 1-minute-32-second bracket. Teammate Robbie Bugden did well to hold onto the final front row placing, and is looking to go one better after finishing on the second step of the podium at the previous round. Suzuki is leading the charge in the Superbike manufacturer standings, overtaking Yamaha at the previous round and looking to build on its points advantage this weekend. Contributing the bulk of the points for the manufacturer this year has been New Zealand Superbike champion, Brother/SsangYong-backed rider Andrew Stroud, who was uncharacteristically off the pace today in qualifying. Shannon Etheridge delivered one of his best qualifying performances of the season, coming in close behind the factory GSX-R pairing to finish in 6th. Another strong performance came from Honda’s Bryan Staring, in his first round of racing the factory CBR1000RR. With teammate Adam Fergusson sidelined, Staring was quick to adapt and showed Honda why their decision to include him in their Superbike lineup next year was a good one – 1.33.324 places him on the second row of the grid in 7th place. “I’m pretty happy with how the session went today, the Superbike is certainly very different to ride but I feel very comfortable on it already,” said Staring. “There’s considerably more power and obviously it’s a lot heavier, but it’s really very smooth through the corners and seems to suit Eastern Creek very well.” “I’m looking forward to getting out there tomorrow and stringing together some good results, we’re not in any kind of championship battle here so I can afford to really push the limits.” Each of tomorrow’s races is good for 25 points, and if the current pace is anything to go by, there is set to be a monumental fight for the minor placings within the top 10 tomorrow, with a number of riders needing every point to improve their championship berths. Racing begins at 9am, with the premier Superbike races set to kick off at approximately 11.30am. |
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2006 Australian Superbike
Championship (YMF Loan) - Round Seven (Final) |
